


A Wanted Man

by dracusfyre



Category: The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Author does what she wants, Continuity What Continuity, Loki Does What He Wants, M/M, Thor gets turned into a frog, Tony also Does What He Wants
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-04-03
Updated: 2017-04-03
Packaged: 2018-10-12 05:36:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,348
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10483227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/dracusfyre/pseuds/dracusfyre
Summary: Tony wasn't born yesterday; whatever Loki is after, he'll probably disappear as soon as he gets it.  But until then, he seems determined to drive Tony crazy, and Tony's never been one to deny himself in the face of overwhelming temptation.





	

**Author's Note:**

> This work was written as part of the 2016 Frostiron Reverse Big Bang, and the art, an amazing fanvid by Postapokalypso can, nay MUST, be watched [here](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=utxquZw-zS0)

                When Tony kicked the door closed to his newly rebuilt LA home, bag of greasy burgers in one hand and an open bottle of Dom Perignon in the other, he really shouldn’t have been surprised to see Loki reclining on his couch and helping himself to the contents of Tony’s liquor cabinet.  From the color of the label on the bottle, Loki had unerringly found the most expensive liquor in the whole house.  Figures.

                “You know, when I asked you if you wanted a drink that one time, it wasn’t a standing invitation to come by whenever you wanted,” Tony said grumpily, tossing his keys down on the end table next to the front door.  He kicked off his painfully uncomfortable but fashionable dress shoes and padded over to the bar, pouring himself a glass of expensive champagne to go with his In ‘N’ Out cheeseburgers.

                Suddenly he felt a wall of warmth at his back.  “No?” Loki said into his ear as he reached around Tony to take a sip of the champagne.  “Do you want me to go?”

                Tony shrugged off the whisper that went down his spine at Loki’s proximity.  “I should, but whatever.  Day's already in the crapper.”

                “Hmm,” was Loki’s only comment and Tony scowled when he noticed that Loki had taken the glass of champagne with him.  He poured himself another and grabbed a burger before going to the couch.

                “So why are you here, Loki?”  Loki raised an eyebrow and saluted him with the champagne glass. Tony rolled his eyes and took a bite of burger, licking the line of grease that crept down his palm.  “Other than that.”

                “Why would there be anything other than that?”

                “That would assume that you think my house is the only place on Earth to get booze, and it’s not like it can even get you drunk.”  Tony took a sip of the champagne and almost spat it back out.  Note to self, burgers and champagne did not complement each other.  He forced himself to swallow it anyway and saw Loki smiling at the look that must have been on his face.

                “Perhaps it’s the company.”

                “Aww, is the God of Mischief lonely?”

                “Are you?” Loki returned, and gestured around the cavernous mansion, currently only lit by a lamp next to the couch and the light over the bar.  “This is a very large house to come home to alone.”

                Tony frowned, stung, as he chewed, and washed it down with the bourbon Loki had left on the coffee table instead of the champagne.  “First of all, I rarely come home alone, I just didn’t feel like it tonight.  Second, you’re telling me you have, what, a sweetheart you go home to after a long day of supervillainry?”

                Loki laughed.  “Didn’t you know, Tony?  I have a veritable army of minions at my secret hideout eager to do my evil bidding.”

                Tony almost choked on his burger as he imagined Loki being swarmed by an army of tiny yellow creatures in blue overalls.  “Right,” he croaked, trying not to laugh until he could swallow his mouthful. “You still haven’t answered my question.”

                Loki watched him for a moment, smile fading into a look of consideration. “I’m looking for something.”

                “Yeah? Looking for what?  The Tesseract is in Asgard, and SHIELD has your staff.”

                “Indeed,” Loki commented mildly. Tony scowled at him suspiciously as he swallowed the last bite.  “As it happens, I’m looking for something else.”

                “Going to tell me what it is?”

                “No.”

                “Is it something we should probably keep you from getting?”  Tony wiped the grease off his hands and picked up the champagne again, settling back into the couch cushions instead of getting up for the other burger.

                “Probably,” Loki said with another smile as he drained the champagne glass.

                Tony sighed and let his head fall back on the couch.  “So why are you even telling me?”

                “Perhaps I want a challenge.”

                He turned his head so he could squint at Loki, who had somehow gotten his hands on the bottle of Dom and was refilling his glass. “Huh,” Tony grunted.  He thought about asking more, but frankly he didn’t really have the energy for a battle of wits tonight.  “Been up to anything else lately? Anything I should know about? I haven’t seen the news in the past few hours.”

                “Hmm,” Loki pretended to think before snapping his fingers as if a sudden thought had occurred to him.  “I have been granting wishes,” he answered loftily.  “You see, I may be contemplating giving up my sinister ways.”

                Tony blinked a couple of times, hand pausing halfway to bringing his glass to his mouth. “Granting wishes,” he repeated. “Dear God, no.”

                “Loki yes.  You aren’t proud?  I thought all humans wanted their prayers to be answered.”

                “I shudder to think of the kind of people that pray to _you_ , Loki.  Also, you’re doing that evil genie thing, aren’t you, where they wish for something and you give it to them in the worst possible way.”

                Loki looked affronted, hand on his chest and everything. “I’m insulted you would think that.  I’ve done no such thing.”

                “So I’m not going to see the results of your good deeds on the news and perhaps have to put on a suit and clean them up?” Tony gestured for Loki to pass the bottle of champagne, not missing how he’d only had one glass but the bottle was somehow half empty.  Whatever, he’d stolen it from a premier of a shitty movie, Loki could have all he wanted.

                “I can’t tell the future, Tony.  Humans are terribly complex creatures.  They ask, I deliver, and what they do after that is up to them.  Free will and whatnot.” 

                Despite himself, Tony had to laugh again at the self-satisfied look on Loki’s face.  Whatever he had plotted or set in motion, Loki himself was very amused by it.  “Whatever you say, Loki.”

                Loki stayed until the end of the bottle, and when he left Tony let himself slide sideways until he was laying down, legs propped up on the arm of the couch.  “Hey JARVIS, I need you to set up a news alert.  Search for people who suddenly developed new or unusual powers, wealth, abilities, etc.  Focus on crime blotters or maybe even human interest pieces.  It would be nice to find whoever Loki’s been ‘helping’ before they incur property damage or kill someone.”

***

                Tony had mostly stopped thinking about Loki’s visit when Steve called from his special Avengers Assemble line, complete with special ring tone. Tony put down his arc wielder and took off his mask and gloves so that he could answer. “Tony, we’ve got a situation,” he said as soon as Tony picked up.

                Tony started heading up the stairs to the outdoor suit gantry, grabbing an earpiece so he could put his phone down. “Alright, I’m suiting up.  What’s happening?” 

                “Loki is breaking into Fort Knox?”  Tony was sure that Cap was trying to be brusque and professional, like he always did during missions, but a note of confused disbelief had crept into his voice.

                “Fort Knox?” Tony repeated as he walked outside, armor assembling around him as he approached the edge of his balcony.

                “We have him on video surveillance.  If we’re fast we can intercept him before he reaches the vault.”

                Privately, Tony was pretty sure that Loki was already gone with the gold, maybe had been before he had ever let himself be seen on video, but he kept his mouth closed in case he was wrong. “Alright, what’s your ETA?”

                “We are coming from DC so we are an hour out.”

                “I’ll be there as fast as I can.”

                In the end, Tony only got halfway there before he had to call Steve back.  “Don’t bother going to Fort Knox, Cap,” he said, hovering in the air over a field in southern Ohio.  “You’re going to want to contact local authorities and have them come to my position.”

                “Why? We’re only a few minutes away.”

                “I found the gold.”

                Below him, in letters big enough that the message could only be read from the sky, Loki had written ‘HELLO TONY NICE DAY FOR A FLIGHT?’ in solid gold.

 

                “You think you’re soooo funny, don’t you?” Tony said sourly hours later, when he found Loki on his couch again, this time reading a book with his feet on the coffee table.  “Feet off my furniture, asshole.”  He collapsed on the couch, groaning as something in his back popped.

                “You didn’t like my gift?”

                “You mean the gold that you stole from the US government and left in some farmer’s cornfield? No.  It was a pain in the ass getting it all back to Fort Knox.”

                Loki affected a look of sympathy.  “That does sound difficult.  Perhaps you need a vacation.”  He held out a hand with a smile.  “I’ve discovered something you may enjoy.”

                Tony looked at Loki’s hand, then the expectant look on his face, then his hand again.  “You must be joking.”

                “Why? Do you think I need to take you somewhere else to kill you? I could do that right here.” He shrugged, hand still outstretched. “And if I was going to kidnap you and take you to some secret location, I would hardly be asking, would I?”

                Tony had to give him that.  He still eyed Loki’s hand warily, knowing that going with Loki was still probably foolish but he really was dying of curiosity and fuck it, this was hardly the dumbest decision he’d ever made.  He put his hand on Loki’s, wondered at the flash of surprise on his face, and then gasped with the sudden freezing cold.

                “Holy shit Loki!”

                “My apologies. I forgot about your fragile human constitution.”  Loki gestured and the snow stopped, air warming until it was a pleasant room temperature.   Around them snow was still drifting slowly from high, almost blindingly white clouds.  Tony turned in a slow circle; directly in front of them when they had teleported was an intricately carved rock face, weathered and cracked but still recognizably an ancient  doorway made by human hands.  They were standing on a wide trail that ended not too far away, but behind them the ground dropped off precipitously into a large gorge, across from which snowcapped mountains marched into the cloudy horizon.  This time, Tony’s breath was taken away by the beauty of the scene.  “Holy shit, Loki,” he breathed.

                “Yes, I thought this was a place of uncommon beauty myself,” Loki said, joining him at the edge of the cliff, hair moving slightly in the wind.

                “Where are we?”

                “The Himalayas.”

                “Huh.” Tony drank in the sight of the jagged peaks, some of which were hidden by the clouds, before he was able to tear his eyes away and turn back to the doorway.  “So what’s this?”

                “I discovered this place during my searching.  I don’t think a human has set foot in it since it was abandoned over a thousand years ago.”  He went through the door, gesturing for Tony to join him.  The cloudy light outside did little to illuminate the inside, so a ball of light appeared above Loki’s hand as Tony followed him down a short corridor.

                “Really?” Tony kicked at the snow drifts that had piled up in the corridor and followed Loki around a corner.  He ran a hand over the stone walls, surprised by how smooth they were and well fitted, with no visible mortar holding the blocks together.  “How did you find it?”

                “I found mention of it in old records in Asgard.  Apparently during the war with Jotunheim a small part of the Aesir army tracked a contingent of Frost Giants here, where they had fled following their defeat by Odin.”  The room they were in now was wide, with a surprisingly high ceiling supported by columns and arches.  On the far side of the room Tony could just make out what looked like an altar, but Loki had moved the light to illuminate one of the walls.  “The humans that were here at the time made a record of it,” he said, gesturing to the wall. 

                Tony moved so that he could see better, seeing now that the walls were covered by incredibly detailed carvings, still crisp from being protected from the elements.   He trailed his fingers over figures of people fleeing from creatures depicted as being twice as tall and carrying fearsome weapons.  He stepped back, speechless. He looked at Loki, who was studying something farther up the wall, almost to the ceiling.  “What are you looking at?” he asked finally, after having failed to find some way to say _this is amazing, Loki, I can’t believe you brought me here to show me this_ without sounding like a dweeb.

                “The carvings near the top are in the Jotun language.  I think they are the names of the Frost Giants who came here.”

                “Ha. Proving that the impulse to write ‘Joe wuz here’ exists across species.”  Tony put his hands in his pockets and looked around the rest of the room, careful not to move too far away from Loki in case the warmth spell was confined to a limited area.  “So you didn’t find what you were looking for?”

                “No.  It was taken from here a long time ago.”

                “Bummer.” Tony whirled as a thought occurred to him.  “Is _that_ why you invaded Fort Knox?  You were looking for this MacGuffin and decided to steal the gold when you didn’t find it?”

                “Yes.”  Loki flashed him a grin.  “I didn’t truly think it was there, but necessity demanded thoroughness.”

***

                “Hello, Tony.”

                “Shit!” Tony’s arms pinwheeled as he started to fall backwards from where he had been leaning his chair back on two legs, completely absorbed in the 3-D blueprint before him.

                But Loki caught the chair before it hit the ground, leaning over it to look at Tony upside down. “Sometimes I wonder how humans do not manage to kill or incapacitate themselves on a daily basis.”

                “You startled me,” Tony scowled as Loki set the chair forward, heart still pounding from the adrenaline of his near fall.  “Don’t even think I don’t realize you did that on purpose.”

                The quirk of a smile on Loki’s lips was small, but it was the only admission of guilt Tony needed. “My apologies.  Should I leave and return at another time?”

                “Depends on why you’re here.”

                “It has come to my attention that humans celebrate the annual anniversary of their birth, which I suppose is understandable since they can expect to have so few of them.   In my wanderings I found something that I thought would be of interest to you.” Loki gestured to something in the corner of Tony’s lab while Tony tried to wrap his mind around the fact that Loki brought him a birthday present.    At first glance it was a just a puzzling pile of metal and exposed wires.  Tony circled it slowly, trying to figure it out.  “Ok, I give up, what is it?”

                Loki dug through the pile and lifted out a metal head and suddenly the mess of parts resolved themselves into a partially disassembled robot, of a kind Tony had never seen before.  “I thought you would like to know that there is another out there building robots to rival yours.”

                Tony scoffed. “They can’t possibly rival mine,” he said, but he started laying out the parts to get a better sense of the thing’s design.  “Who is it? Justin Hammer again?”

                “No, some petty aristocrat by the name of Dr. Doom.”

                “Seriously?”

                “That was much my reaction.  I discovered that he was a collector of ancient artifacts and I had a question about his collection.  He apparently took insult, so,” Loki gestured to the damaged bot.  “This was the only that survived somewhat intact.”

                “You thought he might have what you were looking for so you snuck into his Fortress of Doom, he discovered you, and you had to fight your way out,” Tony translated.  Loki lifted one shoulder carelessly.  “Thanks, Loki.  It’s always good to find out about a potential new player on the scene.  And have a new toy to play with.”  Tony paused, feeling heat crawl up his neck.  “You know, that didn’t come out the way I meant but I stand by that unintentional innuendo.”

                “Any other birthday traditions I should know about? In the interest of furthering human-Aesir…relations?” 

                Tony’s too-helpful brain immediately started playing _Birthday Sex_ , and his quick “nope” came out a bit strangled.  Tony cleared his throat, his brain brought up spanking, and the second “no” was even less convincing.  _Objection, leading the witness,_ Tony thought a little wildly.

                Loki only smiled as if he could hear Tony’s thoughts.  “Happy Birthday, Tony.”    

 

***

                Tony stared out the window on the other side of the conference room, idly daydreaming about stabbing himself in the neck with a pen to bring this interminable board meeting to a stop.  It was the quarterly earnings report and forecast meeting, scheduled for the entire morning, and Tony had to attend both as the last remaining Stark of Stark Industries and because he was still technically the head of the R&D department.  In reality, he’d never even set foot in SI’s R&D spaces, but he did still forward any inventions or ideas that he had to them, so Pepper had arranged some sort of title for administrative purposes.  Pepper, the villainous mastermind behind this meeting, was periodically glancing at him in sympathy as if she could read his thoughts but cruelly refused to make the presenters go any faster.

                So when Loki appeared, in his full battle regalia complete with the cape and ridiculous horns, Tony muttered a heartfelt “thank God” as the conference room cleared with screams of panic.  Pepper, the only one who noticed that Tony hadn’t reacted at all to the appearance of his putative nemesis, exited more slowly, after gathering up all of her files and personal effects.  “Are we still on for brunch tomorrow?” she asked mildly, though Tony could tell her hands were shaking as she tucked her hair behind her ear. _Are you going to be ok?_ Her eyes asked.

                “Wouldn’t miss it for the world, Pep,” Tony answered. _I’ll be fine,_ he said with a small smile and a wink.

                Meanwhile, Loki looked a little insulted at her lack of haste, but when they were finally alone he banished the armor and took a seat in one of the recently vacated chairs, rocking back and forth a bit.  Tony wished he could take a picture of Loki, all dark green and black leather with the glint of metal at wrists and throat, sitting in what must be the blandest conference room in all existence.  Somehow he managed to look more real than the room itself.

                “You know, I was in a meeting,” Tony pointed out after a moment.

                “But you were so miserable I could hear your sorry mood from across the planet.”  Loki’s lips curled with amusement, eyes looking impossibly green as they caught the sunlight. “You are welcome for the rescue.” 

                He couldn’t even argue with that so he changed the subject, trying not to stare.  “So what’s up?  You got that look like you know something you shouldn’t.”

                “I have no idea what you mean,” Loki said innocently.  Tony just raised an eyebrow, unimpressed.  “Well, perhaps I have been doing a bit of research,” he conceded after a moment.  “Did you know they designed a prison in my honor?” Loki looked both pleased and smug as he produced a file folder out of nowhere and set it on the table. TOP SECRET//NOFORN was written across the folder in giant letters and also on the top of every sheet that he spread out across the table.  Loki picked up one and started reading. “’Following the events of the Battle of New York and the apprehension’” Loki snorted here “’of Loki of Asgard, it has come to our attention that there does not exist a prison system on Earth that is capable of holding this or similarly powered individuals.  It is hereby the recommendation of this council that SHIELD undertakes to design, develop, and build a facility capable of detaining such individuals.’” He put the paper down.  “It’s a submarine.  Isn’t that amusing?”

                “Amusing?  Are you saying that it wouldn’t have held you?”  Tony didn’t reveal that he’d worked on some parts of the design.  He wondered where Loki got his hands on that file; he’d probably find out soon enough when someone started screaming that it was missing.

                “Not a chance.  But it was a nice thought.”

                “They built it, you know.  It’s called the Raft.”

                “Hmmm….”  Loki tapped the folder on the desk, eyes far away.

                “Please don’t.”

                “You can’t possibly know-“

                “Don’t infiltrate the Raft for fun.  Don’t break anyone out of the Raft, those people are genuine real-deal murderous psychopaths.  Some of them I even put there.  Don’t destroy it in case we have to put more psychopaths there.  Please, in general, just don’t fuck with it.”

                Loki narrowed his eyes and the file disappeared. “Fine. Everything but the first one.”

                “Deal.”  Honestly it was more than Tony had expected.  “You know, someone’s bound to have sounded the alarm when you got here.  We probably don’t have much time before some of the other Avengers arrive.”

                “True.”  But Loki didn’t move, other than rocking in the seat a little more.  Tony couldn’t blame him, these were top of the line office chairs.

                “Want to get out of here?”

                “You have a destination in mind?”

                Tony leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table with a wide grin.  “Are you a gambling man, Loki?”

                And that’s how Loki and Tony got banned from half of the casinos in Monte Carlo, but not before making a significant dent in their monthly profits.

                That’s also how they accidentally had their first kiss, when Tony won 1.5 million on the river in a tense game of Texas Hold’em. Loki pulled back, surprised; Tony was equally startled, then surprised himself all over again by looking at Loki’s mouth and wanting to do it again. But then a pit boss was shoving his way through the crowd around them and the moment was lost.

***

                After the Monte Carlo incident Fury called a meeting of all of the Avengers.  Well, he _called_ it a meeting in the group email he sent out, but Tony had been the subject of enough interventions to know one when he saw it.

                “Why does Loki visit you, Tony? Why not any of the rest of us?” Steve asked.  Tony had zoned out a bit but he suspected that Steve was in the middle of making some sort of point about Tony being manipulated by a criminal mastermind.

                “Seriously?  Let’s make a list.” Tony pointed at each Avenger as he went around the room. “Nat would stab him; Clint would blow him up; he _hates_ you, Bruce, for obvious reasons; Thor, duh, no explanation necessary; frankly, Cap, I think he thinks you are dull.  And I’m sorry Sam but I’m not entirely sure he knows you exist. Remember, out of all of us I’m the only one who tried to _talk_ to him during the Battle of New York.”

                “ _I_ talked to him,” Natasha pointed out.

                “Darling, I mean this in the nicest way possible, but you may have been a spy for too long if you think interrogation is the same as talking.”  Clint snorted at that, earning a glare from Natasha.

                “Well, what does he want? His staff?”  Bruce asked. He had taken his glasses off and was rubbing his eyes in the way that said that he was amused but didn’t want anyone to know.

                “I don’t think so.  Well, I mean yes.  I would say he probably wants that back, but he said he’s looking for something else.  Probably an ancient artifact.  Thor, do you have any ideas?”

                Thor shook his head slowly.  “I will ask the Allfather when I next return to Asgard.  Perhaps he would have an idea of what Loki seeks here.”

                 “Right.” Tony tossed the pen he had been playing with onto the table, sitting forward in his chair.  “Well, if we do figure it out, let’s keep it between us because Loki’s been going through someone’s top secret files.”

***

                As Happy pulled up to Carnegie Hall, Tony set the alarm on his phone.  Thirty minutes was what Pepper had finally negotiated him up to – he had to show up on time and after thirty minutes of schmoozing he could leave.  He sighed as Happy took a spot in the long line of cars waiting to disgorge New York City debutants.   It was days like today that he debated changing his name to Johnson and walking away from Stark Industries, days when it seemed like he was bleeding out in an ocean full of sharks.   Stockholders meeting this morning, press junket right after, then an emergency Avengers call to decommission a rampaging robot about to destroy Montreal that unfortunately didn’t last long enough to get him out of this nonprofit gala.  Apparently it was in support of Pepper’s pet cause of the month – teen runaway shelter? Underwater basket weaving? Tony couldn’t really remember around this throbbing headache – so he had let her blackmail him into attending.

                For thirty minutes, he repeated to himself. Then he could get blitzed if he wanted to.

                He made it through the gauntlet of reporters and paparazzi with his best smile without punching anyone, escaping to the open bar with a sigh of relief.  As soon as his phone went off, Tony held it to his ear like he was getting an important call, mouthed apologies to Pepper – who looked at her watch pointedly, not fooled at all – and slipped out the back door to where Happy was waiting.

                Two shots of bourbon and twenty two minutes later Happy was pulling up in front of the hottest club in Manhattan, a club with no name, just an address and an art deco statue of a sphinx out front.  Tony pulled off his tie with relief, shedding the jacket of his suit and unbuttoning his collar, feeling like he was finally able to breathe.  A hundred bucks to the bouncer to skip the line and he was in, tension headache paradoxically easing as he was surrounded by a pounding bass beat and flashing lights.

                Somehow above the music he managed to order a drink, just handing the bartender a fifty when he couldn’t hear the total and waving off the change.  He edged out of the thick of the crowd near the bar before someone spilled a well drink on his thousand dollar bespoke suit and found a seat on the far side where he could both be close to the booze and lean against the wall and revel in anonymity.   For a few songs he leaned against the wall, eyes half closed, and sipped at his drink let the beat drown out the noise in his head. Through a break in the mob on the dance floor Tony caught the eye of a man with long dark hair and sharp cheekbones, causing his heart to skip a beat before he realized it wasn’t _his_ eyes, _his_ lips curling into a smile of invitation.  Still, heat had already curled down his spine and settled into his stomach at the thought, so Tony raised his glass at the man looking at him and gestured for him to come over.  Grin widening, the man said something to the people beside him and grabbed his drink.

                Tony did not try to hide his interest as he watched the guy making his way through the crowd; he had the tall, slim build of a runner that was not hidden at all by the tight jeans and black shirt he was wearing.  When he saw Tony looking he grinned, wide and engaging and so without artifice that Tony couldn’t help but smile in return.

                “Liam,” the man said and offered a hand, the noise of the club forcing him close enough that Tony could feel the heat of his breath against his neck.  This close, Tony saw that his eyes were paler than Loki’s, mouth fuller, hair shorter. 

                “Tony,” he offered, hand lingering on Liam’s before he released it.

                “I know,” Liam said with amusement.

                “Yeah?” Tony raised an eyebrow. Seeing that Liam’s martini was almost gone, he took it from him and drained it, shuddering slightly. Well vodka, ugh.  Tony waved the bartender over and leaned over the bar so he could be heard. “Get him the best vodka martini you can buy with whatever president this is,” he said, sliding a bill from his wallet across the bar. “And I’ll have another drink as well.”  He turned back to Liam.  “So how do you know me?”

                “You’re the most famous alumni of MIT.  The professors in the Computer Science department still tell stories about you and I’m pretty sure my thesis advisor jacks off to your annual R&D reports,” Liam said wryly, accepting the drink from the bartender with a nod of thanks.  “I see your picture every day I go to campus.”

                That surprised a laugh out of Tony.  “Flattery gets you everywhere, Liam.”

                “Everywhere?” Liam asked, giving Tony a look over the rim of his glass as he took a sip of the martini.  The knot of interest coiled tighter.

                “Computer science, you said?”

                “Yeah.  Network security and information assurance.”

                Tony leaned back in his seat and crossed his arms, drawing Liam’s gaze to where his shirt tightened across his shoulders.  “You a hacker, Liam?”

                There was that smile again. “I admit nothing.”

                “I hacked the Pentagon in high school.”

                “FBI in undergrad.” 

                Tony tapped the rim of his glass against Liam’s. “Slainte,” he said and took a sip.

               “Can I taste your drink?” Liam nodded and handed it over.  Tony shook his head with a smile and put it on the table, putting his hands on his hips and tugging him closer.  He gave him plenty of time to pull away before he slid his lips across Liam’s, tongue tracing the taste of olives and vodka.  

                “Smooth,” Liam said, sliding a hand up Tony’s arm to his shoulder before coming up to card his fingers through the hair at the nape of Tony’s neck, giving him goosebumps.  “My turn.”  He crowded in even closer, nudging Tony’s knees apart with his hips, mouth slanting across Tony’s and tongue delving inside.   Tony tilted his head and made a noise deep in his throat, hands tightening in Liam's waist.

                “So you know that I’m not going to kill you and hide the body when I ask you to come home with me, right?” Tony murmured against his ear, lips brushing along those cheekbones as he pulled out his phone to text Happy.

                “For Tony Stark, I’d be honored either way, really,” Liam said, and Tony laughed again, the last unpleasant stress of the day melting away at the promise of a _way_ more enjoyable evening.

                Tony was experienced enough to know that immediate gratification was not a good enough excuse to put up with the hassle that was car sex, so the ride back to the Tower was mostly an exercise in self-control, hands teasing, bodies moving together in a hint of the rhythm to come.  In the elevator, Liam was gasping into his mouth while Tony had a hand down the back of his pants, grinding their hips together, and Tony figured getting the first one out of the way on the couch wouldn’t be too gauche. Right?

                “Hello, Tony,” a voice came out of the dark, low and amused, as they stepped off the elevator. 

                Tony’s stomach swooped and he swallowed thickly, arousal clashing with nerves in a way that was somehow making him even more turned on.  He flipped the switch for the lights.

                “Oh, hey,” Liam said in surprise, sounding kind of nervous.  Tony almost laughed when he realized what he must be thinking.  “I didn’t know -“ 

                “Yeah, me neither,” Tony said, voice rough and frustrated.  Loki was sitting on the couch, arms stretched across the back like he owned the place, legs crossed, looking completely at home with loose slacks and a dark green linen shirt.  Tony watched as Loki studied Liam, taking in the black hair and green eyes, the narrow clever hands, and saw when Loki’s smile turned from amused to _knowing._   He cleared his throat. “Hey.  So what are you doing here?”

                Loki’s gaze was predatory as he turned it on Tony.  Tony knew exactly what he looked like - like someone that had been engaging in some enthusiastic foreplay, hair mussed from Liam’s hands, clothes askew.  Arousal completely unabated by the awkwardness of the situation.  After a moment, Loki stood and approached, bare feet silent.  “I came to, hmm, help ease some of the tension from your day.”

                Behind him, Tony could hear Liam shifting uneasily.  “Maybe I should go…?”

                “No, you should stay,” Tony said, turning slightly to run a hand down his back in reassurance.  “ _You_ were invited,” he continued pointedly, but it came out less sharp than he intended when Loki came close enough that Tony could feel his breath stirring his hair.  

                Loki looked down at where Tony’s shirt was unbuttoned all the way to the reactor, and ran a knuckle down the bared skin of his chest.  Tony grabbed his wrist when it seemed like Loki was going to loosen the next button and finish what Liam started. “We could _both_ stay,” Loki murmured, voice dangerously promising.  Tony shivered, hand tightening as _that_ thought blazed a vivid trail through his mind, then down his spine and into his groin. His eyes dropped to Loki's lips for a moment before he forced himself to let go and take a step back.

                “No,” he managed, trying to look anywhere but at Loki so he could keep a hold on his resolve.  “There are rules – well, there aren’t, actually, because for most people it would be _fucking common sense_ , but I’m – anyway. No.” Tony was proud when he managed to end on a strong note, even though his knees were still weak from the look in Loki’s eyes when he’d said _we could both stay._

                But Loki didn’t look offended.  “Enjoy your evening,” was all he said, with a cat-like smile and a small nod to Liam. “Until next time, Tony.”

                Later, when hands were fisting in sheets and tugging on hair, when the air was filled with the sound of bitten off groans, Tony tried his best to not imagine another pair of green eyes but deep down he knew he was so, so screwed.

 ***

“Alright! Alright! Uncle! I’m out, let me go,” Tony wheezed into the mat, exhaling with relief as Natasha released him from the arm lock that was threating to pop his arm off like a little Lego man.   He rolled over on his back to try to catch his breath, waving Natasha’s arm away when she offered a hand to help him up. “No, I’m going to lay here for a while, thanks.”

                “Pepper wanted me to remind you that you have a conference call at 11,” she called over her shoulder as she headed to the showers.  Tony scowled at her as she walked away; he was here lying in a rapidly cooling puddle of his own sweat and she barely looked winded.

                “I’m afraid you’re going to have to reschedule, sir.  Fury is calling,” JARVIS said over the loudspeakers in the gym. “Shall I put him through?”

                “Sure, go for it.”

                “Mr. Stark, I hope you’re not busy.  I need you to go to London.”

                “What’s happening in London?” Tony rolled over and slowly got to his feet, achingly aware of every muscle that was going to be screaming at him in a few hours.

                “An hour ago there was an explosion in a London neighborhood and apparently there were enough ‘unusual elements’ that they requested that I send someone to investigate, and you are the one that can get there the fastest.”

                “What kind of unusual elements?”

                “I’m sending the CCTV footage to you now.”

                As he reviewed the footage on the long flight to London, he had to admit that their wariness of the ‘unusual elements’ seemed warranted.  The cameras were aimed at the street and not at the building, of course, but Tony had enough experience with explosions to know that they usually didn’t come in those colors.  “I’m almost there, JARVIS. Please let local PD know I’m coming in for a landing.”

                He touched down right in front of the house, behind the police cordon that was still keeping the curious public away from the rubble.  “Top of the morning to you,” he said to the closest officer.  “Any new developments I should know about before I risk life and limb by investigating this rickety, bombed-out structure?”

                “Good afternoon to you as well, sir,” the man said, touching his hat in a brief salute.  “No one has gone inside since we contacted the Avengers.”

                 “Righto. I’ll let you know when it’s clear.”

                Tony inched around a corner, careful to stay near the relative stability of the wall and not disturb any debris, and saw a familiar figure stoop to look at something in the rubble. “Loki!” Tony said in surprise, raising his face mask.  “Nobody mentioned that you were here.  Was this you?”

                Hello, Tony,” Loki said as he stood, brushing his hand off on his leather pants.  “No, this was not my doing. I’d hardly be lingering amidst the ruins if it were. But it _was_ sorcerous in nature.  I sensed the explosion from Vanaheim and came to investigate.”

                “Sorcerous, eh?”  That would explain a lot.  “Anything else you can tell me?” Tony moved closer, scanning each portion of the floor before he took a step.

                “Only that whatever this building used to be, the owners had quite a collection of unique magical artifacts.”  Loki moved deeper into the destroyed building, avoiding a death-trap of a staircase by jumping lightly down to the next floor.  “What, if anything, that had to do with its destruction I don’t know.”

                “Yeah? I take it you didn’t find anything interesting.”  Tony followed him down with an exacting use of repulsors so his landing didn’t take him all the way through to the basement.

                “I haven’t been here long.  Travel from Vanaheim takes some time.  But no, I don’t sense it here.”  He moved over to pick something off a desk, freeing it from under a partially melted stained glass lamp. “There is this, though.” Loki held out the object in his hand. 

                Tony tilted his head in confusion as he studied it. “A deck of cards?”

                Loki raised an eyebrow. “You don’t find it a little suspicious that a deck of cards survived an explosion such as this with no damage?”  He started shuffling the deck with long-fingered dexterity, the side of his lips quirking in a small smile.  “If I’m not mistaken, which I’m not, it’s a tarot deck.  Probably the first Tarot Deck, the one from which all others derive their power.  Are you a spiritual man, Tony Stark?”

                “Yeah, right. So you’re going to tell my fortune?”

                “In a moment.  Pick a card.”  He held out the deck.  After a moment of indecision, Tony opened up his suit and stepped out, taking a card out from the middle of the deck.

                “The Chariot,” Tony read.  “Is this for me? What does it mean?”

                Loki took it from him and looked at it with interest. “No, this was my fortune. To get yours you must shuffle the deck yourself.”

                “Is that all you’re going to say?” Tony took the deck from him and shuffled, telling himself that the tingle in his hands was in his imagination. “No insight on what the Chariot means? I’m not much for this woo-woo stuff.”  He held out the deck for Loki to pick a card.

                As soon as Loki drew the card he started laughing. Tony snatched it from his hand.  “The Lovers? Very funny, Loki.”   He shoved the deck of cards back into Loki's hands. Loki tossed the deck into the air above their heads and stepped in for a kiss as the cards fluttered to the ground around them.  Tony had enough time to register the press of strong fingers against his jaw and cool, smiling lips against his own before Loki was gone.   

*** 

                Tony was in the shower trying to get the grease out from under his fingernails when JARVIS announced that Loki was in his living room.   Tony could only thank God for the small favors that Loki hadn’t appeared in his bathroom as he got out of the shower and wrapped himself up in his robe to see what Loki was up to this time.

                He found him standing next to the windows with something in his hands, holding it up to the glass as if letting it look outside.  “Whatcha got there?” Tony asked, scrubbing at his scalp with a towel.

                Loki held his hand to let him see.  “It’s Thor,” he said gleefully, patting it on the head.

                Tony stared.  “Loki, that’s a frog.”  It blinked slowly and croaked.

                “Yes.  But it’s also Thor.”

                “You…you…” Tony couldn’t make himself say the words, they sounded so ridiculous.

                “If you are trying to say ‘turned Thor into a frog,’ then yes, you are correct.”  He smiled down at the frog and looked around Tony’s living room.  “Do you have a bucket? I think I need to put him in water.”

                Tony looked at Loki suspiciously.  “Please tell me this is a joke, and you are trying to make me take care of a frog for a few weeks while you laugh and then eventually tell me that this is just a frog you found in Central Park.”

                Loki looked aggrieved at the question. “Now would I do- never mind. I would do that.  But I didn’t.  This is actually Thor.  He discovered me somewhere I shouldn’t have been on Asgard and I may have acted rashly.”  He held out his hands again and Tony took the frog from him.

                “Alright,” he said, holding the frog up to eye level and feeling silly. “If you are Thor, croak three times, pause, then croak twice.”  When it did so, Tony sighed and hung his head.  “Goddammit, how is this my life now.  JARVIS, google the proper care and feeding of frogs, please.”

                “It has been downloaded to your tablet, sir. I’ll place an order for delivery.”

                Tony sat the frog down on the counter.  “Hang out here for a minute, Thor.  I’m not mentally equipped to handle this in my bathrobe.”  When he turned back to Loki he caught his eyes raking over him from head to toe, gaze hot as if he just noticed that Tony was barely dressed.

                “Oh don’t change on my account,” he murmured with a smile.  Tony raised an eyebrow and frog Thor croaked banefully. 

                “Never mind, you’re coming with me,” Tony said as he scooped him up.  “Don’t judge me,” he hissed quietly after he kicked the bedroom door closed behind him.  “This might be the only way I can get information out of your brother.”  Tony only felt a little guilty for that half-lie when he put a little water in the bathroom sink and set Thor in it before changing into loose sweatpants and a tank top.

                When he came back out Loki had toed off his shoes and shed most of his armor and was stretched out on his couch, one arm flung over his eyes. “Please, make yourself at home,” Tony said dryly, rolling his eyes when Loki raised one of Tony’s bottles of bourbon in response.   Tony got a glass with ice and then a glass of water, setting both on the coffee table so he could pour some of that bourbon for himself before it disappeared.  He pushed Loki’s feet off the couch so he could sit down but instead of moving Loki just put them in his lap. “So why did you bring Thor here?”

                “What else was I supposed to do with him? Let him hop around having heroic frog adventures?” Loki moved his arm slightly so he could look at Tony, eye gleaming with amusement and something else as he took in Tony’s change of clothes.  Tony only felt a little self-conscious as he let Loki look; he’d picked this shirt for a reason. “He could have been killed.”

                “What do you care?” Tony studiously ignored the feet in his lap, definitely not wanting to press his thumbs into the high arches and not even noticing the fine-boned ankles. 

                Loki moved his arm from over his eyes to behind his head, propping himself up with a throw pillow. “Even I am not so cruel as to send Thor to Valhalla to meet his ancestors as a _frog._ ”  He nudged Tony's stomach with his toes. "Not unless I can watch."

                Tony took a fortifying sip of bourbon and a deep breath. “Are you gonna tell me how to turn him back?”

                “Thor’s other friends are already on it. I give them a week at best, maybe two.”

                Tony snorted. “And meanwhile I get to babysit a frog?”  

                “We can have joint custody.  It will give me a reason to visit,” Loki said with a wink.  “Until he turns back, in which case I will likely need to vanish for a while.”

                Tony only smiled, trying and failing to distract himself from where he was acutely aware of everywhere Loki was touching him.  Each point of contact, the pressure of Loki’s feet on his thighs, was…well.  Tony hadn’t felt this hyperaware of someone else since the first months with Pepper.  Honestly, he’d thought he was too old for it, but here he was.  Fighting off arousal because Loki had his feet in his lap and that look in his eyes.  He tried really hard to concentrate on Thor, on frogs in general, on anything except remembering the last time Loki had been in his house.   _We could both stay._  Christ, like that hadn’t been playing on repeat every time he closed his eyes.  He took a bigger swallow of bourbon, grimacing as it burned on the way down.

                Loki startled him by sitting up suddenly, studying him with a gleam in his eye that Tony immediately mistrusted.  "What?" Tony said suspiciously as he moved closer.  Loki trailed his fingers across the back of Tony’s hand before stealing the glass away, leaving a tingling heat in his wake, and he took a sip before setting it down on the coffee table.   Tony watched as Loki moved closer, eyes heavy lidded and dark with intent, and his mind went blank.  “Um…” His gaze was drawn to Loki’s mouth as it slowly curled into a sharp grin.  "What are-"

                “Can I kiss you, Tony Stark?” Loki said, his voice sending shivers down Tony’s spine.

                Tony closed his eyes and counted backwards from ten in Latin, trying to hold on to his good intentions. Good guy intentions? Let’s go with self-control, he decided.  “Why?” He managed finally, gripping the couch tightly to avoid putting his hands on the God of Mischief as he threw a leg over Tony's thighs to sit his lap.  AKA the God of Lies, he reminded himself sternly, who also threw you out of a window.

                “Why,” Loki repeated thoughtfully.  “Because I wish to.”  He traced the neckline of Tony’s black tank top but Tony captured his hands, trying to remain focused.

                “But  _why_ , Loki? What do you want?”

                “You.  The pleasure of your company, nothing more.  I am not trying to seduce you from your path as a knight in shining armor, Tony. Have I ever asked you for something you were not free to give?”

                Tony let out a strangled laugh and released Loki’s hands.  “So you’re just plain trying to seduce me?”

                “You’ve finally noticed,” he said, pleased. But he paused and tilted his head to the side, smile fading slightly.  Tony had to look away from that penetrating gaze, but with a gentle hand under his chin Loki turned his head back to look him in the eye.  “Tony, would you like me to leave?”

                Tony exhaled slowly, unable to look away.  “I should, but no, I don’t,” Tony confessed finally, a little surprised by his own admission.  “I’m fairly sure I shouldn’t be fraternizing with the enemy.”

                “A little late for that,” Loki said with a small smile. He ran a thumb over Tony’s bottom lip. Tony nipped it lightly and watched as Loki’s eyes grew dark.  For a long moment he studied Loki as if it were the first time, the arched eyebrows, the green eyes that could go from amused to aroused in moments, the thin mobile mouth.  Narrow, clever hands that felt so good against his skin, broad shoulders and narrow hips...what was he afraid of, really, besides the day when Loki suddenly but inevitably betrayed him?

                “Yeah, you’re right,” he said, sliding his hands up Loki's thighs as his eyes flicked back up to Loki’s.   “Guess you should go ahead and kiss me then.”

                Loki framed Tony’s face in his hands and tilted his chin up.  “I thought you’d never ask.” Loki dipped his head down for a kiss, long and leisurely, a slow, exploratory glide of lips and tongue.  This time, when Loki’s hands started roaming, Tony relaxed back into the couch and simply watched, eyes heavy lidded and lazy.   He sat forward to help Loki pull off his tank top and forced himself to sit still while Loki explored the arc reactor and the web of scars around it.  “I still don’t trust you,” he murmured when Loki leaned down to put his lips against Tony’s throat, every touch leaving heat in its wake.

                “That’s fair.  Perhaps if you pretended I were a complete stranger?” Loki said; Tony could feel his lips curving into a smile against his skin.  His hands dipped into the waistband of Tony’s pants and Tony shivered.

                “Compared to someone who’s tried to kill me on multiple occasions?” Now Tony’s hands started exploring, trying to find gaps in Loki’s clothing to touch skin beneath.  He made a frustrated sound when all he found was leather and more fabric and at one point, a small knife.

                Loki guided Tony's hands to the clasps in his shirt. “Had I truly-”

                “Yeah, yeah, I’m sure I’d be dead already.” Tony didn’t wait to finish removing everything to slide his hands under Loki’s shirt, humming with appreciation at the feel of the long muscles of Loki’s spine moving under cool, smooth skin. “Guess I’ll just have to keep taking my chances.”

               Later – much later – Tony all but stumbled into the bathroom and froze when he turned the light on to see Thor’s bulbous eyes peering at him over the edge of the sink.  He winced when he saw himself in the mirror; Loki had left one large colorful mark between neck and shoulder and a host of smaller ones scattered across his chest.  Thor blinked very judgmentally, in Tony’s opinion, which was particularly effective when done with three eyelids.

                “I kept it above the waist, I swear,” Tony said defensively, resisting the urge to cross his arms over his chest.

***

                Tony looked up in surprise when he felt hands settle on his shoulders, slightly cool against his bare skin, and grinned when Loki smiled down at him.  “Hey, Loki,” he said, reaching for the remote to pause the movie.  Beside him, Thor croaked and turned himself until he could tilt his head and glare at Loki.

                “Hello, Tony. Thor. Sif and the Idiots Three haven’t figured out how to turn you back yet?” Loki glanced at the brightly colored cartoon on the television. “What is this?”

                “Throg and I are having a movie night.  Princess and the Frog.  Want to watch? It’s almost over, you’re just in time to watch the happily ever after.”

                “Oh, well in that case, how does one resist,” Loki said with amusement, fingers lingering on Tony's shoulders as he walked around the couch.  “Throg,” he mused as he picked Thor up and put him on the arm of the couch and took his place next to Tony.  This time he'd arrived sans armor, wearing some sort of silky looking tunic with only a hint of burnished metal at throat and wrist.  Tony's eyes caught on the shadows of Loki's collarbones and the dip at the base of his throat before he dragged his eyes back to the TV.

                “Thor frog,” Tony said, a beat too late, and saw Loki smirk.  

                “Oh no, I understood,” Loki said as he settled onto the couch and stretched his legs. “I just wanted to ensure that I remember it forever.” Thor croaked angrily and jumped over Tony to land on Loki’s head, crawling down over his face as Loki laughed and tried to grab him.

               “Settle down, Throg, I want to see how this ends,” Tony said with a smile as he returned the irate frog back to the arm of the couch. Thor hissed, which was a noise that Tony didn’t even know frogs could make, but didn’t jump again. Tony was hoping to see Loki react to the cartoon singing and diabetes-inducing ending, but apparently Loki was more interested in watching Tony than the television, because every time he glanced over he saw Loki looking at him, eyes hooded.

                Loki was quiet while Tony turned the television off and carried Thor to his terrarium.  Before he could put him down, though, Thor started wiggling and croaking to the point that Tony almost dropped him.

                “What?” Thor just blinked at him and croaked again. “Look, you’re not the boss of me.  I know what I’m doing,” he lied confidently as set Thor down in the miniature pond and turned on the heat lamp.  Thor only croaked loudly as Tony walked away and wished there was a door to the kitchen so he could slam it loudly and say “you’re not my real dad!”

                When he came back to the living room Loki glanced up at him, mouth quirked. “I imagine Thor does not approve of me being here.”

                “Yeah, most people think I’m a bad influence.” Tony grinned when that surprised a short laugh out of Loki.  He dropped to his knees in front of the couch and pushed Loki back against the cushions, kissing him deeply.

                "Can you be a bad influence on a supervillain?" Loki murmured against his lips, trailing his fingers up Tony's ribs. 

              "I am seducing you from the path of darkness." Tony said, pressing another quick kiss to jaw and throat before sitting back on his heels.   Fortunately this time Loki's clothes were more intuitive, and in moments Tony had his hands and mouth on the smooth skin of Loki's stomach, smiling to himself when he felt Loki's muscles tense and then relax, legs spreading to give him more room.  "I have some pretty persuasive arguments, if you're ready to hear them."

               When he looked up, heat crawled under his skin at seeing Loki watching him, pale skin flushed, eyes heavy-lidded and dark.  Loki smiled slowly and slid his fingers into Tony's hair.  "I'm listening."               

***

                Tony bobbled and almost dropped his bowl of cereal - dinner of champions! - when Loki appeared three days later, cursing vehemently and stripping off armor that was scorched and malformed.

                “You’re looking a little crispy there, Loki,” Tony observed from his position leaning against the bar in his kitchen, toeing a vambrace that landed close to his feet. Part of the design on it had been melted off; since Tony had seen the stuff deflect bullets and blasts from his repulsors, he did not want to meet whatever had managed to do that kind of damage.

                Loki scowled, noticing that some of the leather under the armor hadn’t escaped damage either. “Word may have spread that Thor is trapped in the form of a frog.  Some fire demons thought it was an ideal time to attack Asgard.”  Once the armor was in a pile, Loki started unstrapping the leather armor as well, and Tony wondered just how undressed Loki was planning on getting in his living room.

                With effort he pulled his mind back to the conversation.  “And you defended it? Thor would be proud.”

                Loki winced as he pulled his surplice off his shoulders and slung it over the back of the bar chair.  “He would likely assume that I did so for my own nefarious purposes.”

              “Did you?” Tony asked, watching as Loki pulled off the leather chest plate, leaving him in a high collared dark linen shirt and leather pants.   Judging from the small smile on Loki’s face he noticed Tony staring, so Tony put the bowl down and slid off the seat. 

              “Naturally,” Loki said as he started pulling off his boots. Tony fully intended to offer to help Loki out of the rest of his clothes, but at that moment Thor decided to come out of the terrarium Tony had made him and crawled on the counter, croaking urgently.

               "Yes, hello Thor. Still amphibious, I see.”  Loki’s grin when he turned to Tony was pure delight.  “You made him a cape.”

              “And a little hammer, too.”  Tony pointed into the terrarium where a tiny hammer was leaning against the glass. 

                By then Thor was croaking loud enough that it was impossible to talk over.  “I know, I know.  I would put in a strongly worded complaint to your friends next you see them, this is getting a bit ridiculous,” Loki said, picking him up so that they were talking eye to eye. “I’ll have to give them a hint.”

                “Or  _you_  could do it,” Tony pointed out.  

                “Where’s the fun in that?” Loki put Thor back into the terrarium and he hopped into the little cave Tony had made him for privacy, looking as disgruntled as a frog could look.  Tony turned on the heat lamp and turned off the lights to the kitchen, leading Loki into the living room.  As soon as they were out of the kitchen Loki’s hand was circling his wrist and tugging him in close for a kiss.

                “Hello, Tony,” he murmured.  Tony shivered as he felt lips and teeth against his ear, then travel down his neck in teasing bites.  Cool hands slid under the hem of his shirt and dragged it up slowly, fingers dragging along his ribs until Loki pulled back just enough to pull it over Tony’s head.  Tony tugged at Loki’s as well until Loki pulled it off, sighing with pleasure at the smooth expanse of chest and muscled shoulders he could explore at his leisure.

                While he was running his hands all over that tempting skin, callouses leaving goosebumps in his wake, Loki was crowding him backwards until Tony felt his back hit the wall.

                “Battle get your blood up?” Tony aimed for nonchalant but heard his own breath hitch when Loki lifted him up effortlessly, chest pinning him to the wall while Loki held him up with hands under his thighs.

                “Among other things,” Loki muttered against his neck, rewarding him with a bite on his shoulder when Tony groaned.  "You weren't helping."  He sucked in a gasp when Loki rolled his hips against him, and yeah, things were definitely  _up._ He hooked his legs around Loki’s waist for leverage and pushed back, relishing the deep-throated groan he got in return.

                “Bed?” Loki said breathlessly, fingers so tight on Tony’s thighs that there may be bruises later as he moved against Tony with an urgency that made his head spin.

                “No, here,” Tony managed, burying his fingers in Loki’s hair, tugging Loki’s head back to put his mouth on his jaw.  “Like this.” After a few moments they managed to set a rhythm, rough and needy in a way Tony never would have expected but now he was burning from the inside out. Sensation was rolling up and down his spine and he was barely aware of the noises he was making when Loki slowed to a stop and pulled back, eyes narrowing with concentration. He frowned and tilted his head as if trying to hear something, then they both froze at the sound of shattering glass in the kitchen. A beat later, then –

                “ _LOKI!_ ” thundered a really angry sounding, definitely not still a frog Thor.  

                “Shit,” Tony hissed and let his legs drop, trying to get to his feet.

                “Oh no, none of that,” Loki said, holding him up with one arm under his thighs and another behind his back.  “I’ve worked too hard to get you here to let Thor interrupt.”

                Tony could only blink in surprise as his living room disappeared and was replaced by marble walls, inlaid with complex designs picked out in dark green and gold and covered with tapestries.  He may have made an undignified noise when Loki dropped him on a bed and he felt rich brocade and furs against his back.  Propping himself up on his elbows, he looked around the room, taking in the rich wooden furnishings and books piled carelessly on most available surfaces, clothing on the floor.  Either someone had searched these rooms or Loki was a bit of a slob.  “Are we…did you bring me to Asgard?”

                Loki barely paused as he stripped off his pants and hooked his fingers into the waist of Tony's loose shop jeans, tugging them down. “Yes.  These are my rooms in the palace.”  Tony finally got with the program and helped, kicking his pants onto the floor. Tony moved further back on the bed while Loki crawled on top of him, moaning at the long overdue feeling of skin on skin, and promised himself a look around later. Much later.

***

                The blaring of the Avengers ringtone jerked Tony out of deep sleep, startling him right out of bed.  He winced as his elbow cracked against the end table and knocked over a glass of water.  “JARVIS, what the hell?”

                Instead of JARVIS Steve’s voice came over the line. “Tony! We need you here as soon as possible. Loki is attacking the Triskelion.”

                “What?” Tony rubbed his hands over his face, trying to wake up.  “I don’t-“

                “Tony! Suit up, now! Loki is after the scepter!”  Tony scrambled to his feet at the bark in Steve’s voice.  Thankfully JARVIS was a bit quicker on the uptake than Tony because he already had a suit loaded into the gantry and ready to go.

                “Ok, ok, I’m on my way!” He didn’t even bother for a flight suit, just cursed at the cold as he hit the balcony in his boxers and tank top, trying not to shiver too hard as the suit assembled around him.  His mind spun as he raced south and JARVIS patched him into the team frequency, listening to the team, mostly Cap and Nat but sometimes Sam would speak up, giving updates as they cleared the building.  Since it was 3 am there was only the bare minimum staff, mostly janitors and the poor schmucks who had the midnight shift on the 24 hour watch desk, but every time a casualty was reported Tony’s heart ached and he grew angrier at himself.  “Ok, Cap, I’m only a few minutes out. What’s the situation?”

                “We’ve got a stand-off with Loki at the lab housing the staff.  We can’t get to him, but he can’t get to the staff.”

                “So Rogers and I are about to start playing Pinochle,” Natasha said sourly just as Tony was landing in the plaza in front of the main doors to SHIELD headquarters.

                “Let me guess, Loki showed up and decided to go for the grand entrance by blowing open the doors,” Tony said, eyeing the gaping hole in the side of the building where the front doors used to be.  “Then made his way down to the labs in the basement?”

                “Yeah, that’s the gist of it, minus some collateral property damage and casualties.”

                Tony took a shortcut down to the labs by breaking into an elevator shaft and going straight down; he had done enough tests on the staff’s gem himself to know exactly where he was going. When he got there Natasha and Steve were flanking the doorway to the lab; the door itself, reinforced steel with bulletproof glass, had been flung halfway down the hallway.  Natasha was sitting on the floor, leaning against the wall and staring at her pistols with frustration, both of which were in slide lock and there were at least four empty magazines on the floor. Steve had his arms crossed and was scowling through the doorway. When Tony landed next to him he saw that Steve’s shield was buried in the concrete wall on the other side of the lab.

                “Still a stalemate?” Tony asked, raising his face plate.

                “Yeah.  We can’t get in, nothing can touch him, and he’s just been standing there staring at it for about 45 minutes now.”

                “Just you guys?” Tony asked.  “Where’s Thor?”

                “Couldn’t reach him.  Banner’s too big, Barton’s on leave in Montana.  Sam volunteered but when it was clear we didn’t need air support I told him to go home,” Steve answered curtly.  After a moment he said, almost grudgingly, “We thought maybe you could get through.”

                Tony winced, feeling guilt weigh like rocks on his stomach. “On account of my charm and overwhelming firepower?”

                “If that’s what you want to call it,” Natasha said, tilting her head to look up at him and raising her eyebrows. “After Monte Carlo we all figured you two were-“

                “Why would you think that?” Tony was aiming for outraged but thought it came out a little shrill. He cleared his throat and tried again. “Absolutely nothing inappropriate-”

                “When, Tony?” Steve interrupted, giving Tony his trademarked (probably) Captain America Is Disappointed In You face.

                Tony sighed.  “Last week.”

                “Dammit,” Natasha swore and climbed to her feet.   Steve cracked a smile and held his hand out, and she dug into a pocket that Tony had a hard time believing existed in those tight pants and slapped a twenty into his palm.

                “Steve! You bet that I would sleep with Loki?” Tony frowned.  “I feel slightly offended.”

                “Tony, we _all_ knew you were going to sleep with Loki.  But Steve bet that you would hold out the longest,” Natasha said with disgust. “Barton and I figured you guys did the deed in Monte Carlo.”

                Steve smiled again and clapped him on the shoulder while Tony gaped. “What can I say, I believed in you, Tony.” The smile fell a little as Tony continued to gape. “If we hurt your feelings I’ll take you out to dinner once everyone pays up.”

                “Screw you guys,” Tony said finally, scowling, and stomped into the room with Loki.  “I’m going to go deal with this _serious threat_ to _national security_ while you guys make bets on my love life!” He shouted over his shoulder.

                “That serious threat to national security _is_ your love life!” Natasha shouted back.  Tony scowled because he didn’t have a good answer to that. “He wouldn’t even let us through the door!”

                “Hello, Tony,” Loki said absently, eyes distant as he faced the staff.  He had to have heard that entire exchange but he didn’t so much as look at Tony, much less smile or make a comment.  The bad feeling Tony had on the way over came back with a vengeance, making him feel a little queasy.

                “Hey, Loki,” Tony said carefully, like Loki was a middle aged man standing on the edge of a roof. “What’s up?”

                “Sir, he appears to be attempting to break down the shield around the staff,” JARVIS said quietly in his ear.  Since Loki had started showing up it had become standard security protocol to put an energy shield up around the lab when no one was actively examining the scepter and the stone inside.  Tony had helped design the shielding device, an almost exact match for the one that guarded the Tesseract device during the Battle of New York, so he should probably feel more proud that it had kept Loki at bay for 45 minutes and counting.  Instead, he wished he could just walk away and let Steve and Nat deal with this, but…well, it had been too much to hope that this would never happen, hadn't it?

                “I had hoped to be finished with this task before you arrived, but you were rather clever in designing the shield.  I suppose I took too much time getting to the point.” Loki gestured at the scepter, secured to a stand on a table in the middle of the room and surrounded by sensors and supercomputers trying to make sense of the data coming from the sensors.  SHIELD had been running tests on it since they had recovered it from Hydra, but were still not very close to understanding what they were looking at, much less a safe way to try to manipulate its energy.

                “Yeah.  While I always appreciate the big dramatic entrance and I’m sure beating up all those guards was good exercise, but we both know you could have bypassed all of that and come straight here.”

                Loki shrugged. “I didn’t want to give anyone cause to question your loyalty.”

                “Oh. Well, thank you for that,” Tony said, a little surprised.  “Now the only thing they question is my virtue.”

                At that, one side of Loki’s mouth did turn up slightly, the only indication he’d heard the conversation from the hallway, but it quickly disappeared, leaving Loki looking more serious than before.  

                “Loki, please don’t –“ Tony started, but Loki shook his head.

                “I need the staff, Tony.  I’ve let you keep it this long-”

                “ _Let_ us-“

                “-But events beyond my control require its return,” Loki finished, the finality in his words making Tony’s stomach sink. “The only reason I’ve waited this long is I am determining the best way to retrieve it without creating an energy backlash that would destroy the entire building.” Tony had a vivid recollection of watching footage of a secret SHIELD base turning into a giant hole in the ground. 

                “Right, thanks for that.  So when you say events beyond your control…”  

                “Why are you asking?” Loki turned to face him, arms crossed.  “If I tell you, will you just _give_ me the staff?”

                “Uh…” He didn’t look behind him because he didn’t need to see Steve and Natasha to know that they were probably shaking their heads hard enough to give themselves whiplash.  “No, I imagine if that were ever to happen there would be a lot of meetings and paperwork involved.  And, I don't know, maybe supervised usage involving Thor…”

                Loki turned away.  “As I thought.”

               "Hey, the attitude doesn't seem fair, you were the one wrecking New York with it," Tony protested.  Loki only shook his head and raised his hands.  Tony hesitated a moment, trying to find the right words, before he sighed and closed his faceplate, blasting a hole in the ceiling right above Loki’s head.  Loki cursed as the impact of a couple of tons of concrete and rebar sent him to one knee.  Tony fired his repulsors him but Loki deflected it, throwing off a slab of concrete and climbing to his feet.

                “You can’t stop me, Tony,” he said, eyes shadowed as he threw Tony backwards with a wave of his hand.  He turned back to the staff as green and gold light started coalescing around his hands, the glow starting to outshine the light of the staff behind him.

                “We’ve done it before,” Steve said, and his shield came spinning towards Loki from over Tony’s shoulder. With a snarl Loki caught it and dropped it on the floor with disdain. 

                “Don’t even think about it, little spider,” he said without looking, and Natasha froze along the far side of the wall.  “If I were you, I would run,” he said, kicking Steve’s shield away, then turned back to the staff and the invisible field protecting it.

                Tony understood his plan immediately.  He stomped on the edge of Steve’s shield like he’d seen Steve do a hundred times, not stopping to see if Steve caught it as he snatched Natasha out of the air just as she was about to land on Loki’s back, stingers out and arcing electricity. He had just enough time to twist and put his body between Natasha’s and the concrete wall when Loki overloaded the force field, sending out a shockwave in all directions.  The impact as he was thrown through the concrete wall and hit the floor beyond left him gasping.  He tried not to hold on to Natasha too tightly as the wave sent them rolling down the hallway, barely avoiding the rain of debris from the ceiling.  They slid to a stop just before the elevator, thankfully avoiding falling down the open elevator shaft.  Natasha rolled off of him and got to her feet, shaken and pale but otherwise intact.  Tony gave her a thumbs up when she glanced down to see if he was ok, and then she was sprinting down the hallway shouting for Steve while Tony climbed laboriously to his feet.

                At the end of the hall the entrance to the lab had disappeared under a pile of concrete and pipes. “Steve!” Natasha called out, trying to listen for any sound on the other side of the rubble. Tony started shoving the wreckage to the side, blasting slabs that were too big to lift.  Even with his suit it took them a good fifteen minutes to dig their way to Steve, who had thankfully managed to get the shield up to protect himself from the worst of the rubble. Loki was gone, of course, along with the staff.  The rest of the lab was also in shambles, and Tony could see at least three floors up through the hole in the ceiling.  

                “I’m sorry, Steve,” Tony began, but Steve just shook his head and coughed, spitting to get the gray concrete dust out of his mouth.

                “Don’t be sorry, Tony, just help us fix it.”

***

                “Sir-”

                “I know, JARVIS.”  Tony locked his keyboard and spun around.

                Loki eyed the ice pack strapped to Tony’s shoulder before scanning the rest of his body, as if he could see through the clothes to any injuries underneath. “Tony,” he said cautiously.

                “Loki.”

                “I did warn you-” he started, but Tony cut him off angrily.

                “Like we were just going to stand by and let you retake the staff from under our noses without a fight,” he snarled.  “Did you think that sleeping with you made me soft in the head?”

                “Did _you_ think that sleeping with you somehow meant that we were never to cross swords again? That we were no longer mortal enemies?”  Loki’s face was stony and his hands were clenched into tight fists.  The staff was nowhere to be seen, which was perhaps a good sign. Loki hadn’t come here to finish him off or try to turn him to the dark side.

                Tony’s laugh at that had little humor in it.  “Don’t be so dramatic.  _You_ are not my mortal enemy.  I met my mortal enemy. He smiled at me while he ripped my heart out,” Tony said, rubbing a hand over his arc reactor, “after I crawled out of the hell that he sent me to.”

                Loki sighed and looked away for a moment before his eyes met Tony’s again.  “The fact remains that I won’t let you keep me from what I seek.”

                “You mean the staff wasn’t it? Fuck.” Tony rubbed his face tiredly.  “Well then I guess I’ll be seeing you around.”  The words _I’m sorry_ were on the tip of his tongue, but Loki had already turned away so he swallowed them and turned back to his computer.

                Loki hesitated and turned around, _I’m sorry_ echoing painfully in his chest, but his pride would not let him say it to Tony’s back. In his mind he heard _No, Loki_ , so he left.

***

                Weeks later, Tony had been roped into going to another high society event, this time a fundraiser for local schools that had rented out the entire Natural History museum during the first night of a new exhibit showcasing ancient Mesopotamian art.  Checking out the exhibit, on loan from the British Museum, had successfully killed the first forty-five minutes of the event, but since then Tony had been circling the room, assiduously avoiding conversation.  His mood was sullen and irritable because he kept hoping Loki would show up and also hoping he wouldn’t and going back and forth between the two was pissing him off.  He went up to the bar for a refill on his alcohol and to his disgust got cornered by Coulson.

                “Agent,” he said curtly, taking a stout swallow of his drink as he scanned the room for the millionth time.

                “You know my name is Phil,” Coulson said amiably, the way he said almost everything.  He leaned against the bar, going for casual. “How are you doing, Tony?”

                “Fine.  Though every time someone asks me that, I get less fine.  Did Pepper put you up to this?”  Tony eyed him sourly.  He could feel a tension headache starting to crawl up the back of his neck.

                “No. Steve.”

                Tony snorted. “Figures.”  Coulson started talking again, but Tony stopped listening halfway through when a pair of green eyes caught his before they disappeared into the crowd.  He went cold, then hot, then cold again, fingertips numb.  He drained his drink and ordered another, trying to gather up his courage. 

                “Fascinating. Have my people call your people,” Tony said, cutting Coulson off mid-sentence.  Making his way through the crowd was a struggle in itself; he forced himself to be patient as people stopped him to try to make small talk and propose the next thing that was going to make Stark Industries a billion dollars.  But Tony caught up to Loki as he was studying an example of an Akkadian Tree of Life, carved on a stone plaque that had been stolen from Mesopotamia during the height of the British Empire. “I like the suit, Loki. Human fashion looks good on you.”

                “Yes, I know.” Loki turned, smile dimming as he saw the bags under Tony’s eyes, the lines of tension around his mouth. “You look…”

                “I know,” Tony said, rolling his shoulders uncomfortably.  “I haven’t been sleeping well.  Long nights in the lab.  Too much self-medicating with alcohol.” He gestured with his glass and took a long swallow.  “But what else is new, right? So what are you doing here? Fan of ancient Mesopotamia?” Tony squinted, looking at the dates on the piece Loki had been studying.  “Wow, this is even before _your_ time.” 

                "Tony..." Loki stared at him, eyes narrowed, as Tony kept babbling nervously. 

                “Well, look at the time.  I hate to tell you but you showed up just as the party is ending.” Tony pulled his sleeve up a bit so he could get to his watch, pressing his thumb against the screen.   Six autonomous suits took up positions at each exit to the room, two at the main entrance.  Natasha, Maria, and Sharon, who had been mingling with the crowd, started calmly shooing people out of the room. “Whatcha think? I got the idea from that birthday present you gave me.  I call them the Iron Legion.”

                “So this is a trap?” Loki said with some amusement, but Tony didn’t miss how he passed his staff, disguised at the moment as a particularly elaborate walking stick, from one hand to the other and shifted his weight warily.  

                “Well, we weren’t going to let you walk away with the time gem like you did the mind gem,” Tony commented, taking a sip of his drink and hoping that his hands weren't shaking. 

                “How did you –“ Loki narrowed his eyes at Tony. “Thor.  Where did _Thor_ learn of the infinity gems?”

                “I think he called it a Norn cave?”

                “He asked the _Norns_?” Loki swore and he turned away, both hands on his staff like he was wringing Thor’s neck by proxy. “I should have crushed that fool as a frog since he has so little regard for his own existen-” he stopped and turned, sending a blast of blue energy at the man who had come up behind him.  The man dropped the spell he’d been casting to create a shield, absorbing the blast harmlessly.  Loki’s gaze raked him up and down for a long moment, sliding over his unassuming suit to linger on the oversized amulet resting on his chest.

                “We haven’t met,” Loki said finally.  "I'm Loki."

                “Dr. Stephen Strange, Master of the Mystic Arts and Sorcerer Supreme.” Dr. Strange tilted his head in greeting.  The half-finished stop time spell hung in the air, sparking green and flickering as Dr. Strange and Loki studied each other warily. 

                “Sorcerer Supreme?" Loki asked, raising an eyebrow.  In his hands the walking stick lengthened into the spear, wickedly curved blades cradling a light blue stone. "Did you give yourself that title, or-”

                “Enough, Loki,” Thor dropped down from the balcony to land on an Assyrian era altar showcased in the middle of the room.  “Return the mind gem or we will take it from you.” He stepped down from the altar and drew his hammer from behind his back.

                “And a hearty ribbit to you too, Thor.” Tony almost choked on his alcohol as Thor’s face somehow grew _more_ thunderous. “Tell me, what did the Norns ask for in return for your knowledge of the Infinity Gems?  The Allfather lost an eye, but you seem hale.” Loki eyed Thor with exaggerated speculation.  “Perhaps you lost something _under_ the armor…”

                Thor growled and took a step forward.  For a moment Loki was enveloped in green and gold light and when it dissipated his suit had been replaced with his armor.  Loki whirled the spear as he backed away from the altar, scanning the room with quick movements as more Avengers revealed themselves.  "I suppose I should be honored," he commented.  "You have me thoroughly outnumbered."

                 Tony, not being stupid, had started moving out of the line of fire as soon as Thor appeared, trying not to attract too much attention to himself as he went for the suit he'd stashed behind the bar. He kept one eye on Loki and was listening to him with half an ear when he felt something sharp and pointy digging into his back; raising his hands, he tensed and prayed that he hadn’t drastically misjudged Loki’s character.  He didn't struggle as Loki put his hand over his mouth and started dragging him into a corridor.  One of the Iron Legion turned its head to watch them go, but its instructions had been to guard civilians so without further guidance from Tony it kept its position.  In the center of the room, another Loki was still insulting the Avengers and waving his staff around threateningly.

                Once they were clear of the main hall, the hand over his mouth vanished. “Please don’t put a hole in” _me_ “my shirt,” Tony hissed with what he thought was admirable calmness considering his heart was pounding.

                “Don’t give away my position,” Loki said under his breath, hustling Tony through the corridors towards the exit with a hand between his shoulders. 

                “So, what, is this you running away? Am I your hostage?”  

                “Discretion being the better part of valor, yes.” The pointed tip of the spear left the approximate position of Tony’s kidney and, with a gesture from Loki, disappeared. The armor also vanished in favor of his much less noticeable suit.  “Your Dr. Strange has a surprisingly strong teleport block over the building, so I need to get out of its range.”  They started to go out the front doors but the police had set up a blockade, keeping a crowd of people away from the building.  Blue lights flashed and there was a rumble of a helicopter overhead.  Tony saw Loki’s eyes narrowing as he considered fighting his way out. With a sigh, Tony took his arm and instead tugged him towards the back of the building. Looking at his watch, he judged that Steve would probably let Loki stall for another 2.5 minutes to ensure that all civilians had been evacuated, particularly the high schoolers that were getting exclusive tours of the museum as part of the fundraiser.

               "You know we’re not going to stop trying to get the mind gem back," Tony said as he led Loki through increasingly narrow hallways. Tony had memorized the map of all the exits while they were setting up this ambush.  This was a service entrance that backed into an alley; the police were guarding the exits of the alley but the alley itself was empty.  Smelly, but empty.  

               “And I, the time gem.” They must have left the perimeter of Dr. Strange’s spell because Loki’s shoulders noticeably relaxed. He turned to face Tony, eyes searching.  Tony put his hands in his pockets and stared down at his feet, suddenly unsure what to say, but then Loki tilted his chin up and the ball of ice in Tony’s stomach started to thaw.  “It was a clever trap, Tony. I'm impressed.”

                “So no hard feelings?” Tony couldn’t keep the edge of hopefulness from his voice.  

                Loki smiled and framed his face, pressing a quick kiss to his lips. And another, when Tony couldn’t keep from smiling, too.  “No. I’m not finished with you yet.”

**Author's Note:**

> According to a few minutes of cursory googling, one of the meanings of the Chariot is 'driven towards a specific goal' and the Lovers is 'conflicted about a choice you are facing in life.' Look at me, I'm so meta.
> 
> [Tumblr, I'm on it](https://www.tumblr.com/blog/dracusfyre)


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